Ah craigslist, your ability to bring bizarre novelties, inane rants and tirades, fantastically bad trade propositions, and epic transgressions against the English language out of the wood work is what so endears you in our hearts.  For the past couple of months I have been attempting to sell my Bandit 1200 via craigslist (not because I don’t love the bike, mind you, but because I really want to try a naked V-twin like the SV650 or Monster).  In my ad I clearly state the models of bike I would consider in a trade, and a ballpark price I would accept for a sale outright.  Of course that doesn’t stop people from offering wacky and irrelevant items in trades, for example a 1996 Dodge Intrepid.  This is an expected part of the craigslist experience, but once in a while you encounter an offer so zany as to impel the most battle-hardened craigslist veteran to cock an eyebrow.  Here’s one such offer.

To: sale-958016510@craigslist.org
Subject: For trade or sale: 1997 Suzuki Bandit 1200 (naked) - $2400 (Greensboro)
Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 20:45:46 -0500
X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.930.3)

** CRAIGSLIST ADVISORY --- AVOID SCAMS BY DEALING LOCALLY
** Avoid: wiring money, cross-border deals, work-at-home
** Beware: cashier checks, money orders, escrow, shipping
** More Info: http://www.craigslist.org/about/scams.html

I have a g5 power mac that is well worth over $3987.32. It has a 2.3
ghz dual processor, 2 gb of ram, 250gb hard drive, os x leopard
10.5.6, 20" apple cinema hd display.It has logic pro 7 fully
functional and working, ilife 08 and microsoft office 2008. All
aluminum body and upgradable to 16 gb of ram and 1 terabyte of hard
drive (1000 gb) I'm looking to trade
let me know thank

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Neglecting the sheer oddity of even offering a PC in a trade for a motorbike when the ad leaves no doubt about what I’m willing to trade for (specific motorcycles), the Power Mac described is about 2-3 years old, and most of us know just how well computers hold their value against time as Moore’s law marches on.  Perhaps the Mac cost $4,000 brand new, but even if it did it’s worth a fraction of that now.  Upon consulting a friend and eBay, I’d expect a 2.3 GHz G5 Power Mac + cinema display to fetch a little upwards of $1,000 today (and personally I wouldn’t pay that much for three year old hardware).  Just for kicks, let’s see kind of Mac I could get through retail channels for the asking price of my bike…

Dual 2.8 GHz quad-core Xeon Mac Pro

Wow, that’s quite a lot of Mac! Oh craigslist, you’re incorrigible!